TOKYO: North Korea launched two ballistic missiles eastward early on Wednesday (Jul 19), Japan’s and South Korea’s militaries said, just hours after an American ballistic missile submarine arrived in a South Korean port for the first time in four decades.
Both of the missiles appeared to have fallen outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone, the Japanese defence ministry said.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) called on the North to cease such launches.
“We strongly condemn North Korea’s successive ballistic missile launches as grave provocative acts that undermine the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula as well as the international community,” the JCS said in a statement, adding that the launches clearly violated United Nations Security Council resolutions.
The United States military said that it was aware of the missile launches and was consulting closely with its allies and partners.
The launches do not appear to pose an immediate threat to the United States or to its allies, but the events highlight the destabilising impact of North Korea’s illicit weapons programme, the US Indo-Pacific Command said in a statement.
The first missile reached an altitude of 50km and covered a range of 550km, while the second one rose as high as 50km and flew 600km, Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada told reporters.
Japan lodged a protest against the missile launches through diplomatic channels, he said.
Source: CNA
